Leaving Terra Firma

Getting Obliterated in the Dancing Swarm of Fireflies, Yayoi Kusama

This project began in a time of great political unease and division in the United States. I was looking for a way to express my feelings about the current political climate, and coincidentally visited an exhibit called "You Who are Getting Obliterated in the Dancing Swarm of Fireflies" by Yayoi Kusama.

I expected the exhibit to be quite beautiful, and astounding. What I did not expect was the discomfort, disorientation, and unsettled feeling that I experienced upon entering the room. In a way that now informs these pieces in this series, it was a very physical and visceral reaction that made me empathize with the artist and what must go on inside her at times.

I named the series "Leaving Terra Firma" because my experience inside the installation left me feeling otherworldly, and no longer grounded.
By combining an image of myself with an important memory of a day, each of these pieces become a visual metaphor that is linked to my feelings about the uncertainties in our country, and the seeming endless swirl of cataclysmic events that redefine our reality.